Westminster High School

Bus stops changing because of construction Utility work on West Green Street will not be completed before the opening of schools tomorrow and will affect the stretch between Old New Windsor Road and Bond Street. Affected school buses are: Bus 16A, serving Friendship Valley Elementary School: The stop at West Green Street at Park Avenue will remain. The West Green Street at Kings Lane stop will be at the alley at 215/217 W. Main St. The stop at 94 W. Green St. will be at Old New Windsor Road at West Green Street.

CENTRAL Charles St. improvement group to meet The Charles Street Improvement Association will meet at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at Union Memorial Baptist Church, 160 S. Center St., Westminster. Plans will be finalized for a community cleanup day. All members of the community are welcome. Information: 410-871-6373. Winters Mill to offer AP session Wednesday Parents and students who have signed up for Advanced Placement classes at Winters Mill High School for 2005-2006 are invited to attend a "Meet the AP Teachers Night" at 7 p.m. Wednesday.

A group of North Carroll High athletes visits Spring Garden Elementary to encourage students to look for "slam dunk" moments in everyday activities, such as shoveling a neighbor's driveway. Meanwhile, students at Century High hold a benefit concert to raise funds to build a memorial to a former student killed in a car accident last fall. And middle-schoolers from across the county learn ways to embrace diversity. These activities are in the spotlight as a new half-hour program, CETV Newsmakers: On the Positive Side, hits the airwaves in the school system's latest effort to spread the word about the good things students are doing.

Film series concludes tonight with `Croupier' The Carroll County Arts Council will conclude its international film series today with Croupier. A 1998 British thriller rated R, Croupier follows the story of Jack Manfred, a stalled novelist, as he drifts back into his former profession of casino croupier. When he begins writing a novel about a croupier, the line between him and his fictional alter ego becomes increasingly blurred. The films stars Clive Owen, Gina McKee, Kate Hardie and Alex Kingston.

Installing air conditioning at Mount Airy Middle School will be a lot more costly than Carroll County officials originally estimated and will require money allocated to other projects to make up the shortfall. County commissioners approved a transfer yesterday of nearly $1.3 million to the project that will install air conditioning in the nearly 50-year-old building. The transfer, some of which is money remaining from completed projects, will allow the county school board to proceed with awarding a contract.

In a little-known program at Winters Mill High School in Westminster, parents are reacquainting themselves with the finer points of linear systems and variable expressions - and finding out that algebra has come a long way since the last time they took the math class. Those who sign up are spared homework and tests but are coming away with the confidence to help their children navigate algebraic functions. The parents also get a chance to win a nearly $100 graphing calculator. They've discovered that while algebra still revolves around problem-solving, the questions have shifted to a more real-world application, said math teacher Kirstie Troutman, who created the parent class that she offers over three Wednesday nights each semester.

In a rousing declaration, the Republican presidential candidate asserted his stand against embryonic stem cell research because it means "we have to kill someone." The candidate's impassioned delivery won thunderous applause from a crowd of about 900 students in Westminster High School's auditorium and brought many to their feet. "There is nothing wrong with adult stem cells; we don't have to kill anybody" to harvest them for research, said Joel Ready, a 16-year-old sophomore, as he pumped his fists into the air and maintained that several diseases have been cured through advances in adult stem cell research.